Anna Loseva and I had a discussion about our thoughts about two different transcripts. I've read that she already wrote about her ideas a few hours ago. For my own, I think I did not understand the task really well and thought that we should both write about the same transcript, so I wrote some about ga3 and ga1. I would like to first talk about ga3.
For ga3, I picked that activity because for me, I was kind of looking at it as a scientific activity because I was thinking of an exploratory activity for that. I though I can change it into a more investigative activity instead and hide the cars around the classroom and make them look for the cards as if they are going on an exploration. This can help them get the idea of "finding" things through experiencing it. This is based on the belief that students learn more if they involve feeling in learning. I remember when I was teaching Physics when I was in the Philippines, to teach projectile motion, I would throw the eraser across the classroom. The students would be surprised, and that would help them remember about the topic.
For ga1, I would change that activity by giving more examples and letting them find the similarities and differences in the "lonely hearts ads". I think that this in turn, would give them more options to choose from and can help them better understand what that kind of ad is for. I think more options can help students understand better what we want them to learn because these can give them different kinds of vocabulary and maybe some of those, they have already encountered.
Those are my ideas for the Pair Activities for this week. Hope to see you later. I'm sorry, I haven't attended a live class before because I have had a series of unfortunate events.
For ga3, I picked that activity because for me, I was kind of looking at it as a scientific activity because I was thinking of an exploratory activity for that. I though I can change it into a more investigative activity instead and hide the cars around the classroom and make them look for the cards as if they are going on an exploration. This can help them get the idea of "finding" things through experiencing it. This is based on the belief that students learn more if they involve feeling in learning. I remember when I was teaching Physics when I was in the Philippines, to teach projectile motion, I would throw the eraser across the classroom. The students would be surprised, and that would help them remember about the topic.
For ga1, I would change that activity by giving more examples and letting them find the similarities and differences in the "lonely hearts ads". I think that this in turn, would give them more options to choose from and can help them better understand what that kind of ad is for. I think more options can help students understand better what we want them to learn because these can give them different kinds of vocabulary and maybe some of those, they have already encountered.
Those are my ideas for the Pair Activities for this week. Hope to see you later. I'm sorry, I haven't attended a live class before because I have had a series of unfortunate events.
Dear Bei,
ReplyDeleteYour use of the word exploratory is very important. There is a book by one Douglas Barnes who talks about exploratory talk and final draft talk. Your activities--putting the cards around the room and having students find them is exploratory thinking which might lead to exploratory talk.
In the video of the lesson I transcribed the teacher puts her hand on the floor and says "I found it" When I show the video without the sound not one teacher so far has said she is demonstrating the word found with her gesture. They say touched usually since this is what she did.
So not only did the students not explore but they were shown a gesture that did not illustrate the meaning.
This video is attached to a book that is required reading in some states in the US. I see the video as an example of how to prevent students from learning.
The teacher said 446 words and the students 37.
Throwing an eraser to show projectile motion is an example of what I call "reminding students of what they already know." They know the action of throwing but do not know the term so you reminded them that they know the idea and then said here is one term for what you already have experienced and therefore know.
Re the lonely hearts transcripts, again having students explore rather than the teacher explain I think leads to more learning and the learning becomes more personal.
Re not attending, no problem except of course we miss your face and comments live. But you can watch the videos and of course read all of the comments from participants and my comments.
All the best.
John
Bei, I like what you said about throwing the eraser. I think adding the element of novelty in any lesson can create a memorable impression. It's like the things John has said about working with the same text repeatedly but presenting it in different ways.
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